


We The Survivors

by AxlotlAtHeart



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Character Death, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Jaime Lannister/Brienne of Tarth, Injury, Minor Arya Stark/Gendry Waters, Minor Theon Greyjoy/Sansa Stark, Multi, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-season 7, Sibling conversations, and maybe other chapters because i am not nice to theon, because apparently that's all i know how to write, hints of theonsa, holy shit am i bad at tagging, more characters may show up, not jonerys centric but it's in there, not really sure where this is going, random scenes i put together, shameless h/c in the first chapter, should i start calling this canon divergence now?, sort of theon-centric, will be multi chapter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-21
Updated: 2019-04-27
Packaged: 2019-08-05 03:21:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16359755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AxlotlAtHeart/pseuds/AxlotlAtHeart
Summary: Basically this is a bunch of scenes that I came up with concerning the aftermath of a  battle between humans and the army of the dead. In this story Theon has brought some of the ironborn to Winterfell to join the battle and is in the north with them. He will feature pretty heavily in this. This is a bit of an experiment because it's my first time writing a multi chapter fic, and one featuring more than two characters. It's just a collection of semi-connected scenes I could see happening as everybody's regrouping in the north between battles.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Really not sure where this is going or how far it will go but I have a couple chapters planned. Warning you now I may be very slow to update. First chapter is Theon's POV and includes some shameless hurt/comfort so...deal with it I guess.  
> Have fun.

The dead were all around.

As far as Theon could see in any direction, there was not a single sign of life. Only the dead, and the snow.

Looking up and out was the worst; where all there was to see was a field of corpses, both of those who had been men before and those who had already been dead when they died again. Looking up and seeing them all like that, spread out across the horizon, made him dizzy, almost sick. But if he looked down he had to look into their faces, blue with the cold, and that was worse, so much worse.

Forcing down deep breaths, he moved on. The sight of it all still had his senses reeling, the sounds of the battle still ringing in his ears. He had seen dead men before, he had killed men, he had been in battles… but never like this. The one wight he had seen in King’s Landing was a shock enough, but an army of them like this was more than he could ever have imagined. And they were nearly indestructible. Fighting them off, he had been almost certain the entire army would be slaughtered, but they had somehow prevailed.

This, as they realized only once the fight was done, had not been the whole of the Night King’s army facing them. Gods knew where the rest of them were now, but their absence gave the survivors a brief respite as they regrouped and made new plans. And as they looked for any other living amongst the dead.

Theon continued his trek over the corpse-strewn battleground, doing as he had for the past several hours. He forced himself to look at each body, turn them over if he was unsure, but none were alive. The long gash on his arm stung fiercely in the cold, and he stumbled with exhaustion. More than once he almost fell. He was about to give up, to turn back and tell Jon and the others he had found no more survivors, when he saw a small stark-white figure amongst the dead. 

Pulse quickening, he hurried towards the body. Not her, of all people…the last he had seen of her, she was riding on the back of a dragon in the midst of the battle, looking like a warrior queen out of a legend. After that he had lost sight of her, but assumed he would have been able to tell if the dragon had fallen…then again, the battle had been so chaotic, so confusing, and he had been locked in his own mind thinking only of his own next moves, of how to stay alive. 

Theon knelt by her and turned her over, as gently as he could. Her skin looked almost grey against the snow. Several deep red stains darkened the white furs, but when he hastily pressed his fingers to her neck he found the faintest possible heartbeat. Weak and rapid, but present. 

“Your Grace?” he said uncertainly, shaking her shoulder, “Daenerys?”

She did not stir or make any sound, but now that Theon knew she lived he could see her chest rising and falling with weak breaths. He looked around frantically, but there was no one near. The others were too far to hear him if he called…

As gently as he could, he put one arm around her shoulders and the other under her knees, and lifted her up. She was not so heavy, but his exhaustion made him stagger with the sudden weight, and his own injured arm shook from the strain of it. Shaking off his sudden concerns of what Jon might think when he saw her in his arms, he heaved her partly over his shoulder and made his way back to the other survivors. 

A few times he nearly dropped her, stumbling over uneven ground. He regretted having to carry her in such an undignified position, but it was the best he could do. 

The dark figures by the edge of the field were becoming more distinct. Theon saw Jon turning over bodies just as he had. One of the men near him saw him approaching and got Jon’s attention. His head went up and Theon saw his face drain of colour when he realized who it was he was carrying. 

The other man ran to him, eyes on the motionless figure over his shoulder. Theon spoke quickly.

“She’s alive,” he said, “But she’s lost blood, we need to get her back to the castle.”

“Let me take her.” Rather gratefully, Theon allowed him to take her gently in his arms. For a long moment Jon stared disbelievingly into her face, at the many wounds on her body, before tearing his gaze back to Theon. His eyes went to the gash on his arm.

“You’re bleeding,” he said.

“It’s nothing. Jon, take her back to the castle. Make sure she’s taken care of. I’ll stay here with the others, keep looking…”  
Jon gave him a long, hard look. “You come back with me. You’ve done enough.” He gestured to Theon’s bleeding arm, “And you should get that seen to.”

“It’s fine. Really, I can keep going-“

“You’re done, Theon. Come back, rest a little. It’ll be dark soon anyway.”

As much as he wanted to insist he should stay on the field, there was no way he could win against Jon’s stubbornness. And he was much too weary to argue, anyway.

The two of them set off across the frozen moors. It was indeed getting late, the clouds above them darkening in the west. They walked quickly, and without speaking. The great grey castle was just visible over the next hill, but to Theon it looked miles away. He couldn’t help repeatedly glancing at Daenerys’ still form as they trudged, realizing with a stab of guilt that were she to die it would be his fault for not bringing her back quickly enough. Although his legs burned and his breath was sharp and painful, he quickened his steps. 

The more they walked, the more Theon began to feel the residual aches and tiredness the battle had left him with. The longing to lie down and sleep intensified with each step. By the time they had reached the gate his legs felt like lead and his head swam. When they were a few yards away, Jon stopped him, looking him in the eye.  
“Thank you,” he said, “For finding her.” It was all he said. He was inside before Theon could respond.

 

Inside its cold stone walls, Winterfell was packed with people. Stark soldiers, Unsullied, and Ironborn alike hurried around, or else sat together. Theon even saw who must have been some of Jaime Lannister’s men going by. Mostly those of the same group would stick together, but some intermingled. This war had brought them all together, if it had done anything good at all.

Jon led him to the doors of the Great all. It was even more crowded in here, and it was easier to feel it. The amount of mingling human bodies and layers of voices made the room seem smaller than it was. It was warmer in here with the fire blazing at the end, but Theon still shivered as he stood in the doorway. A few people passing him looked strangely at him, and he automatically dropped his gaze to the floor. 

Jon went ahead with the queen still in his arms. A few people spotted them instantly and hurried to help. She would be alright now that they were back at the castle, Theon had no doubt of that. Likely she would be taken to a proper room somewhere to be tended, as they had done with some of the worst cases. But there were not enough bedchambers in Winterfell to house all the injured, so most were simply taken to the Great Hall for assistance. All those unable to fight stayed behind to help them, Theon saw older men and women making their rounds assisted by some of the younger children.

Some of the wounded sat and ate or talked amongst each other if they were able, others lay wrapped in blankets on the floor. Nearby Theon saw a boy no older than thirteen with a bloody bandage around his knee. There had been children fighting with them too, boys and girls both. He tried very hard not to think of their bodies. 

Among the crowd of survivors, he caught a glimpse of a familiar tall, red haired from, and his heart dropped. Sansa. She was busy, carrying one end of a stretcher to the end of the hall, and did not look up even to see her brother leaving. 

A powerful emotion rose up in him as he watched her. She was strong, so strong, even now. He longed to go to her, to hold her and let her hold him and simply relish the fact that they were both alive, safe for one more day. If it were up to him, he would never want to leave her side. But no…no, it wasn’t right for him to think like that. He wanted to keep her safe, to shelter her, to make sure she was kept from harm…but he was certain if she knew she would only say she didn’t need a protector. And even if she did, she would not want it to be him. 

A side door opened to reveal Jon returning. To Theon’s surprise, he came back to his side. He still looked quite shaken as he spoke.

“They’re looking after her now,” he said, “The maester was with her, he says she could still pull through.” 

Theon had a feeling Jon was saying this more to himself than to him. “Good,” he said, “She’s strong, Jon. She won’t die.”

Jon caught his eye, looking at him almost suspiciously. Theon himself did not fully understand why he was trying to comfort the other man, when he knew nothing he said could make the situation any better.

Now Sansa turned to the doorway. Her face looked tight and weary, but her eyes widened when she saw them, and she quickly made her way towards the two men. She hugged Jon first, briefly but warmly. 

“I saw them bring the queen in,” she said as soon as they broke apart. “Jon, is she-?”

“She’ll live. They… they wouldn’t let me stay with her.”

“Go back later, when they’re done. Sit with her.”

“Has…has Arya got back yet?”

Her face grew taut. “No. Not yet. I’ll tell you when she does.”

The look exchanged between the siblings made Theon want to turn away. He hoped very much that Arya Stark was alive, and was sure she must be, somehow. Nevertheless he felt he was intruding on some private grief. 

Sansa turned to Theon then and, to his surprise, pulled him into an embrace as well. She was warm, and smelled like summer. 

“Are you alright?” she asked him, hands still on his shoulders. Her eyes searched his face worriedly. 

“I’m alright,” he said.

She frowned, noticing the dark stain on his sleeve, “You’re hurt.”

“It’s fine,” he said quickly, “A scratch, it’s not that bad.”

She looked unconvinced, “I’ll look at it. It ought to be cleaned at least.”

He wanted to protest but ended up just nodding wearily. 

“Jon; you’re not going back out yet, are you?”

He shook his head. “I want to. I should. But I want to be with Dany…I want to be with her when she wakes up…”

“Stay then,” said Sansa, “At least for a while. Do you need anything?”

“I’m alright. I’m going to go back…see if the maester needs anything…”

Sansa nodded, understanding him. “I’m sure everything will be alright.” 

She touched his arm briefly as he wandered away, looking uncharacteristically lost. If Theon had not been so tired and numb, he would have felt sorry for him.

“Come,” said Sansa, “I need to look at your arm.”

“Are you sure you-?”

“I didn’t stay here to do nothing. I know I’m no healer, but I’ll see what I can do.” 

She led him down the length of the hall, past the wounded and the sick and the dying. Some of them must have been near death. Nearby a woman was wrapping a body in a sheet, one that looked so small it made Theon’s stomach turn to look at it. He could not look, did not want to look at the blood or hear the tears or see the dead children…

As he walked, he found his entire body shook with tiredness at every step. The room spun. By the time they reached the end of the hall the whole floor seemed to be swaying under him. He stumbled and Sansa put a steadying arm around him.

She had him sit down by the far wall, and told him to wait as she went to grab what she needed. He sat feeling faint and tired, shivering all over. Out of nowhere he thought fearfully of hot iron. Would she burn the wound to stop it bleeding? The thought of white-hot metal against his flesh made him shudder, brought back heaps of unpleasant memories. It was not much of a consolation to know that he had faced worse.

Theon put his head in his hands as another wave of dizziness hit him. He was so tired. And yet the thought of actually getting to sleep seemed impossible, not here, not now. Every time he closed his eyes he saw again the rows upon rows of the dead marching towards him, marching as they never should have been able to. It wasn’t natural, it shouldn’t have been possible, and yet it was. 

Even when he managed to block out those images, he was left with the faces of their own dead in the snow. It was the children’s faces that disturbed him the most, and it was those that he found most difficult to get out of his head. 

“Here,” said a voice. “It’s water, drink it all.”

He looked up to see that Sansa had returned, and was holding a cup out to him. He took it and drank gratefully. Just the small amount of water helped ease the faint, sick feeling. His head felt a little clearer. 

“You’ll need to get the armor off,” he heard her say, seemingly from a long way off. He nodded and began undoing his armor with cold, clumsy fingers. It wasn’t long before he felt her undoing it along with him, finding the places where it fastened and unfastening them where he could not reach. 

He hadn’t realized how heavy it all was until he had the relief of removing it. He unlaced the thin jacket he wore underneath as well, dropping it unceremoniously beside him, and got his first good look at his injured arm. 

It was worse than he had thought. The entire left sleeve of his undershirt was slashed and soaked with blood, so much it had leaked through his jacket as well. Sansa pushed the torn, bloody sleeve up to his shoulder, quickly but gently, and he braced himself for whatever was underneath. He bit back any cries of pain, but couldn’t help wincing as the fabric caught on the more jagged edges. 

Underneath was a bloody mess. Theon could not quite tell where the cut began and ended, or how deep it went. He was not stranger to the sight of his own blood, but looking at it made him feel slightly ill. 

Sansa took a wet cloth and began quickly sponging away the blood and grime. The skin underneath looked very pale, the old scars that already crossed his skin standing out white. Theon saw now that the cut ran all the way from his shoulder to his mid forearm. And it was deep. He was not worried yet; it was not by far the worst injury he had yet to sustain, but he couldn’t deny it was unsettling to look at his own sliced open arm. And Gods, it hurt. 

When most of the blood had been washed away, she began carefully cleaning out the cut itself. He tried not to flinch as the cold stung against its ragged edges. 

Sansa took the arm in her hands and examined it more carefully. Theon noticed she did her best not to touch the sensitive, raw-looking skin surrounding the gash, for which he was grateful. Her hands were cold against it, though, and he fought to repress a shudder as an unexpected chill hit him. 

“It looks deep,” she said, frowning. “But I don’t know if I should stitch it, it looks really inflamed. The skin around it, does that hurt too?”

“Yes.” 

She looked deeply concerned. “It could be infected. If that’s the case, I think I should just bandage it, in case the stitches make it worse. I’ve cleaned it out as best as I could, but I’m worried something already got in earlier…”

Theon nodded vaguely, distracted by pain and exhaustion. He did not care very much what she did, or if the thing was infected or not. The words slipped through his mind without much consideration, nothing quite registering properly. The world around him looked almost unreal, seeming to waver and tilt as if he were looking at it through a flame. His bones ached so much he wondered if he would ever be able to move again. More than anything, he wanted to sleep. 

He hardly noticed when she began tying a bandage around his arm. He watched her as she worked, eyes on her tight, concentrated face. Even through the haze of weariness he felt a stab of sorrow on her behalf. He remembered, almost forcefully, how she had been as a child, before everything had happened. So innocent, so carefree with her dreams of knights and ladies and dragon slayers. She should not be here, in this hall filled with the dead, stoically tending the wounds of her old friends. She was strong, and she would survive the war, Theon had little doubt about that. But he wished she did not have to be here, and now. A part of him wished they could all still be carefree and young, not having to feel the terror of looking death in the face each day, only to live, but feel the relief of it for only a moment before they must go out and do the same once more as soon as the sun rose again.

For the past few days, during the battles, he had tried very hard to keep these unpleasant thoughts from swirling around in his mind. Now, though, now he was hurt, and drained, and weak, too weak to stop the feelings of dread and misery that came to him. As soon as he was better, he would go back out there and fight, again and again until he died or the war finally ended. Hundreds would die, perhaps thousands, whether they won or lost.

This, he thought, this was indeed the end of the world. 

“There,” said Sansa, “You’re done. I hope it holds.” Theon looked down to see that his arm was tightly bandaged. Sansa was looking at him carefully. She raised her hand to his face, making him flinch, but she only touched his forehead. “That should be cleaned too,” she said.

“What?”

“You’re cut, all over your face. I don’t think they’re very deep, but I should maybe clean them, at least get rid of some of the blood…”

He could not remember getting any wounds to his face, although it could have happened sometime in the haze of battle. He knew he had been thrown to the ground more than once. 

“I’ll do it,” he said, moving to take the cloth from her, “You’ve…you’ve done enough. Thank you. But I can…”

She shook her head, “Let me.” 

The cloth was back on his forehead before he could protest. Hesitantly at first, he leaned into her touch. 

Her hands were cool and steady as she began to clean his face, washing the blood away from his skin, his sweaty hair. The cloth stung against what must have been many scratches he had not felt until now, but at the same time felt soothing against his skin. He watched as the stain on it grew darker and darker; he must have been covered with blood. Perhaps that was why people had been staring at him. 

A part of him felt ashamed of himself for letting her do it; she should not need to look after him. But it did feel good to let someone else help, to have someone take care of him for a while. Some small part of him was glad she was there to do it. 

After she had finished, her hand lingered on a cut near his eye, examining it. Suddenly she frowned, touching his cheek with the back of her hand.

“You’re very warm.”

Theon pulled away quickly, “I’m alright.”

She still looked suspicious. “I’m fine,” he insisted, “Really. Just tired.”

“You should rest.”

“I will. I promise. Are you sure I can’t do anything first? Anything…to help in here?”

“No, you’re alright. Just try and get some sleep.” She paused. “Wait. Just-wait here a moment. I’ll be back.”

‘’What are you-?”

“Just wait here.”

She left, and he waited. He felt very cold now. Even with the fire so close, the heat seemed miles away, unable to reach him. He hugged himself, rubbing his arms fiercely, but the deep chill persisted. Whatever warmth Sansa might have found, he felt no trace of it. 

It was only a few minutes before she returned, carrying a small bundle. Theon tried to hide the fact that he was shivering, but she seemed to notice despite his efforts.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, sounding concerned, “Are you cold?”

There didn’t seem much point in lying. “I can’t seem to get warm,” he said, “I’ll be fine, I think. It’s just…cold.” 

Sansa removed something from the bundle and handed it to him. “Here,” she said, “Put this on.”

It was a shirt. “Why?” he said suspiciously.

“You’re covered in blood. There’s no way you’ll be comfortable, trying to sleep like that, I managed to find you a spare. I don’t know if it’ll fit, but it’s clean.”

He took it, but did not put it on. “You didn’t have to,” he muttered, “You didn’t…I don’t need…” his words were getting tangled with tiredness. 

“Theon,” she said sternly, “Just put the shirt on.”

He nodded, giving in. He began to remove what he was already wearing, but stopped abruptly, chest suddenly feeling very tight. She had not seen before…no one alive had… there were people all around, they would all see him…

Sansa’s hand went to his shoulder. “I can turn away,” she said, her tone gentler, “I don’t have to look if you don’t want me to…”

So she had some idea, even if she did not truly know. Theon shook his head. “It’s fine.”

Warily at first, then all at once, getting it over with, he took his shirt off. He tried to make it quick, covering his scarred body as much as possible with his arms, but no one else in the hall looked around. The only one seeing him was Sansa. He was grateful, then, that she made no comment. Her eyes briefly scanned over the many old scars that covered his chest and arms, her mouth a tight line, but she said nothing of it. Hastily he pulled the spare shirt over his head, not liking the feeling of the cold air on his bare skin, and sat there, shaking slightly. It was done…that was it, it was over. And it didn’t matter…it didn’t matter…

Sansa’s hand was on his shoulder again. “You need to lie down,” she said, “Take these. They’re not very warm, I’m afraid, but it’s all we have.” She handed him two thin blankets which he wrapped gratefully around himself. 

“They’re fine. Thank you, really, thank you…for everything, I don’t know what I’d do…” he shut his mouth quickly, not wanting to start rambling again. 

“Do you need anything?”

“No. Thank you.” 

“You lie down then. Just…rest as much as you can.”

He nodded and lay down right where he was sitting, pulling the blankets tighter around him. The new shirt was too large for him, the sleeves covering his hands, but it was clean. And warm. Sansa was still there, sitting beside him as he tried to get comfortable. Part of him wanted to ask her not to leave. 

Vaguely he thought that with the pain and cold it would take him forever to get to sleep. But almost as soon as he shut his eyes, even as his arm throbbed and he shivered against the cold flagstones, he could feel his exhaustion taking over. It was hardly a minute before he was asleep.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter is from Jon's POV. It's a bit short, sorry about that. Should have mentioned before but I'll do it now; the chapter lengths of this thing will vary. This is my first time writing anything Jonerys-y so let me know how I did! Feedback in general is appreciated- this is the first multiple POV fic I've ever done, so if you have any tips on how to get a better sense of so many characters I'd be happy to know.   
> Next chapter will be from Arya's perspective.

The warmth of life was finally returning to the pale fingers, tiny in Jon’s own. 

For an hour at least, he had sat by Dany. Waiting, only waiting, and holding one of her hands in both of his. He did not pray often; if the Gods were real they had a habit of not answering him, but he had prayed when he first saw her body. And he had prayed during the impossibly long minutes he had spent outside her chamber door as they tended to her. 

He had not seen her wounds yet. It would be far too hard for him to look; if he saw he might lose hope. As of now he still could allow himself to linger in that space between knowing and not knowing, between certainty and uncertainty. So long as he did not know for certain how bad it was, he could convince himself she would live. 

The thought of actually seeing the wounds that pierced her was almost unbearable. It reminded him all too strongly of images he fought hard to lock away; of another battle, and another woman he had loved. 

That night he had felt as if it were he that was wounded and dying, that his heart too had been pierced by a deadly arrow. Nothing else had mattered, not the battle raging around him, not the fires or the giants or the sing of steel…only Ygritte. And he would have taken the arrow himself, would have thrown her aside to let it hit him instead. Just as he would have taken any of Daenerys’ wounds himself had he been with her.

He had lost sight of her during the battle, lost sight even of her great dragon. Since she had been brought to him he had cursed himself relentlessly for that. If he had been near her, seen her…if she died now it would be because of him. He thought again of Ygritte, of her bright hair and snow on her cheeks. He had let her go. He had failed her, and betrayed her. He would not fail Dany. 

It felt like an insult to her memory to love the queen at all. But she was gone, and Dany was here, and now, and he could not let her down when she still lived. 

His eyes lifted almost unwillingly to her face. It was the wrong thing to do; she was so pale she might have been a corpse already. Automatically Jon squeezed her hand tighter. Eventually, he kept telling himself, eventually there would come a time that she squeezed back. 

Letting go of her fingers for just a moment, he arranged the furs and woolen blankets more firmly around her. He allowed his fingers to briefly rest against her forehead, stroking her silvery hair, but pulled away quickly. As much as he longed for her to wake, it would be cruel to disturb her rest. And it was difficult for him to think of her – in that way. He knew it was too late; he had already thought of her like that for far too long to fall out of the habit now, he had kissed her, lain with her…and then it had all gone up in smoke before it had barely started.

She did not yet know what Bran had told him. The army of the dead had hit them so shortly after; there was hardly time for him to process it all himself, let alone tell her and give her time to reflect. 

He had felt numb, as this strange, stoic version of his little brother told him the wonderful and terrible truth about his parentage. Mingled with the horror, the confusion, was still a great sense of relief to know, to finally know the facts that had been kept from him for so long. Even as he denied it, as he told Bran he believed no word of it, there had been a lingering doubt. A part of him perhaps had known, known some part of it, long ago. He was no bastard. But he had never been Ned Stark’s son either. 

And Dany…Dany’s life, her entire existence, had been tied to his long before they had even met. Long before he had known she lived, somewhere across the world he was sure he would never see, their fates had been tied. He thought of his own face, studied it in his mind, searching for some trace of his father’s lineage. But all he knew was the look of the Starks. Yet the woman that lay before him now, the powerful, beautiful woman that he loved was of his own blood. She was not the last Targaryen, but one of two. And she was his own kin. 

A part of him felt that it would not matter, if she ever knew. The Targaryens had married brother to sister for centuries, his own grandparents had been cousins. And, he realized suddenly, his other grandparents had been siblings. But it was more than that. He had lived a lie; everyone and everything he thought he was had gone. He was not Ned Stark’s son, he was not even a bastard, the very thing he had been mocked for all his life, and yet it had been what defined him. Now he was nothing. 

For a long while he had stat there, brooding over these thoughts as the remains of the day wheeled past him. It was night now, there was nothing but blackness beyond the windows. There was not even a moon. It was so dark these days…day and night the sun hardly showed its face. Winter was truly here. 

 

Jon heard the door opening before he even had a chance to see who it was. Even when he turned sharply to look, in the split second before it became obvious, he did not recognize the small figure. But he felt his heart drop as he took in the dark hair and grey eyes in a white face. Stark eyes. 

She leapt into his arms so fast she nearly knocked him over. Though she had grown, she was as easy to lift as back when she was eleven. 

“I’ve missed you,” she said as they let go. “I thought they must have killed you.”

He smiled a little, the first one in a very long time. “Not yet,” he said. “You got back alright…where have you been? Sansa and I thought…”

“I saw Sansa already. She was the one who told me where to find you. I was far from the castle is all, it was a long walk back.” The dark brows knitted slightly. “I’m sorry if I worried you.”

“I think it would take a lot for me to stop worrying at the moment. There’s nothing you can do about it.”

His eyes fell to the slender blade at her waist. “You still haven’t lost it yet, then?” 

“Not yet. Almost, a few times. When I was gone, I mean. But it always came back to me. I think…if I lost it now…it would feel like losing my arm.”

“I’m glad it’s served you well.” 

He was a little surprised she still had it. It must have meant a lot to her, more than he could have hoped. He was touched, to think it could be so important to her that even through everything she had managed to hold onto it. As he was processing this it hit him, suddenly, violently, that Arya was not his sister. The bond of siblings that had held them together for so long…what did that mean now? He thought she might still see him as her brother, even if he told her the truth. He could imagine her fiercely insisting that they were brother and sister, no matter what. It would be just like her. And for a brief moment he debated on telling her right there, right then, just to get it over with – but he couldn’t. If he was wrong, and all he saw when he told her was disappointment and anger… he didn’t think he could bear to see it.

“Is that her?” Jon broke out of his reverie to see his sister’s eyes fixed on Dany’s still form behind them. 

He sighed. “Aye,” he said, “That’s her.”

Arya went to her bedside, looking curious. “She isn’t dead?”

“No. Not yet.”

“But you’re worried?”

He looked at her. There was more knowledge in the young girl’s eyes than he would have guessed. “More worried than you know.”

Her eyes searched the face of the other woman, frankly and unashamedly. She had seen plenty of death since Jon had last seen her. She had seen plenty of wounds.

“She’s pretty,” she said finally, giving Jon a knowing look. “I can see why you fell for her.”

He didn’t have the time or energy to be embarrassed. “You don’t.” he said, “No one really does. You haven’t seen what she can do.”

“I saw her ride her dragon into the battle,” said Arya. For a moment Jon caught a hint of childlike wonder in her voice. “I didn’t know there was anyone in the world who could do that. I thought the dragons were all dead.”

“So did most people. So did I, until I heard about her.”

Arya shifted her feet, looking at the ground awkwardly. “I’m not angry, you know. I’m not angry you bent the knee to her. I know it’s a bit late to say it, but it’s true. Sansa wasn’t happy, but to me…I mean, as long as she’s not a Lannister I don’t care much about which queen or king we have. Even Sansa feels alright about it now, I think. We talked about it.”

“Yes, I got the feeling she and Dany had started to warm up to each other. Before…” before the Dead attacked. Before their patchwork quilt of an army set out to face them all in chaos.

They stood together in silence over the body of the queen. Even with the shutters closed, the candlelight flickered. Night had fallen. Out in the yard, through layers of wood and stone, Jon could hear distant shouts. Not panicked, but weary and direct.

“They’re bringing back the bodies,” Arya said quietly, “I saw them when I came in. They’re going to burn them in the yard.” She turned back to her brother. “How long have you been up here with her?”

He was not sure. It hardly mattered. 

“A while,” he said, “A couple hours, I think.”

“Why don’t you come down with me? We should help them.”

Jon sighed. “I can’t leave her, Arya. The maester said she’ll get better, but I just don’t know. I’m afraid to leave her alone.”

“You’re not going to make her wake up by standing over her,” she said rather harshly, “We’ll send someone back to check on her once we get downstairs, but there’s no point in hiding up here. We have to do something useful.”

Jon was torn. The thought of leaving Dany alone and wounded was almost unbearable, but then again “doing something useful” sounded like the most comforting thing in the world. To simply do something, anything, that took his mind at least partly off his own conflicting thoughts and feelings would be a relief. 

“Aye, you’re right,” he said. “I just… I can’t lose her too.”

“I know.”

Ygritte came into his mind again; he had left her side, and then what had happened? He had left his father, and Robb, and Rickon, all for the sake of doing something he had been sure was useful. 

But he had left Arya in the same way. He had left Sansa. And they lived still. 

“I’ll come with you,” he said. “I just need a minute.”

He looked one last time into her face, taking in its beauty. A strand of silvery hair hung over her forehead and he brushed it away, bending to plant a kiss on the smooth skin. A fleeting hope ran through him that she might wake at his touch, but it was in vain. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Arya look away tactfully. 

“I’m ready,” he said, forcing himself to tear his eyes away from her, “Let’s go.” 

He did not glance back as the left the room, fearing if he did he would never be able to look away.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm back! This chapter is about Arya, and next time we get back to my squiddy boy and all his angst. Enjoy.

Arya heaved her end of the corpse onto the makeshift pyre. The rest had been laid side by side with any measure of respect that could be spared, though privately she thought it would be quicker to simply pile them on top of each other in a heap. And they needed to be quick; none of them knew when the next wave of wights would be upon them, or how long it would take for the bodies they already had to change. Arya figured she would rather have her body disposed of disrespectfully than come back as one of those things.

Sansa had told her not to stay and help. She had told her to rest, to keep her strength up if she planned on fighting again. It would be the more logical thing to do, but she refused to admit defeat. Although she was tired, and hungry, and cold. It would be a relief to sit by the fire with a hot bowl of stew, to sleep. 

But she wouldn’t. She had fought just as well as the men around her, better than some, and they did not rest yet. What help would that be to anyone? She was uninjured, a little fatigue would not kill her…though it was unpleasant. She bitterly resented being small.

“I can take this one,” said the man at the head of the next body. “It’s the last for this group, I think.” 

He picked up the dead man, slinging him over his shoulder. Arya watched as they lit a fire beneath the first pyre, watched the flames creep steadily up the wood and then to the dead on which it lay. She had seen plenty of death, plenty of bodies. She herself had been the bringer of many of those deaths. But this was more dead than she had ever seen together, in the same place at the same time. Winterfell seemed to house more dead than living at the moment. And outside its walls on the battlefield were even more. 

Before her, the bodies burned. In the light of the fire and the light of the torches many were carrying, she saw carts upon carts piled with more corpses being brought in through the gates. More pyres would need to be built, many more. She couldn’t help hating the smell; of burning flesh, burning hair, but she made herself stand there. It was good that they were burning. The alternative was worse by a thousand fold. 

“How many more?” she asked a passing soldier. 

“A good deal more, my lady.” 

It was time to build a second pyre. 

She began assisting the builders, heaving piles of wood and twigs onto each other. The younger children who had not been able to fight scrambled around, looking for extra bits of wood that had been overlooked. Arya worried that soon they would run out, and have to start using the logs kept in the castle for fires. Though it was unlikely it would come to that; they reused as much as they could, and the dead burned on their own after a while.

Several of the children were running back and forth from the gates to the Godswood, arms full bundles of sticks. Arya lit a torch and went to the gate too, thinking she would have more luck for wood in there.

It was quiet beyond the walls. The chaos of the battle aftermath did not seem to penetrate them at all, as if they were protected by some ancient magic. Only the silent snow fell. Her torch was the only thing to break the darkness.

Her footsteps were muffled by the snowfall as she walked through the trees. It had been a while since she had come in here and truly appreciated it. She had been back only once since she came home, and then she had been too distracted by seeing Bran again to pay attention to it. But it still looked the same, though so much else had changed. 

She began collecting whatever sticks and dried leaves she could find. There were plenty, but most were buried or dampened by snow. If that was all they had, it was all they would use. The wind rattled the branches overhead.

She did not realize she had come to the heart tree until she found herself standing right under it. The white branches spread above her like a canopy, leaves still blood-red , refusing to fall even in the depths of winter. As she walked around the tree, the carved face on its trunk came into view. To tell the truth, it had always unnerved her a little. But even so she drew a kind of strength from it. She was of the blood of Winterfell, and this tree was the heart of Winterfell. This tree meant home. 

The pool was frozen over, so she walked straight across it to the tree. Her father had always said you could hear the Old Gods’ voices if you got close enough. But all she heard was the whisper of the wind and faint rustling of leaves. What would her father say now, if he could see them? If he could see any of them? 

Shaking away old thoughts and memories, she headed back to the gates with her bundle of twigs. 

The path back to the yard seemed strangely subdued as she made her way back to the pyres. She heaped her findings onto the pile of wood that had been collected. As she looked at the rows of corpses ready to be burned, and the many more wounded being brought to the hall inside, she felt a surge of weariness. It would take all night, perhaps even into the next morning, to dispose of all the bodies. They did not have enough time.

Near the gate, a small crowd had gathered around what Arya presumed was yet another body. It would not have caught her attention if she had not glimpsed Sansa’s red hair among those standing.

Her mind jumped immediately to Jon, before remembering that he was safely outside with the rest of them. If not him, or the Targaryen queen, who’s death would be enough that so many would stare?

A prickle of fear came into her chest and she forced it down. She would need to be calm, whoever it turned out to be. 

Sansa turned and saw her coming. She tried to say something to her, but Arya avoided her sister and headed straight for the middle of the group. The face she saw on most of them was not one of grief; for some it was surprise, others only mild distaste. 

When she did see the body, at first she did not recognize it. It was the armor she noticed first- Lannister armor. And a metal hand. 

A wave of several very different emotions washed over her. She now understood the grim faces of the people around her. Jaime Lannister, the man who had tried to kill Bran, who had fathered Joffrey…surely she ought to be glad he was dead. She had wanted to put him on her list not long after she found out what he did to Bran. Yet he had fought on their side, in the end. He had brought men loyal to him to join them. Should she feel some measure of compassion, at least now that he was dead? 

No. It was easier to hate him. Far easier to think of the bad things, and be happy he had been killed, rather than try to let anything else in. He had done vile things, and now he was dead, and that was good. 

In spite of all this, she could not help feeling surprise as well. Everyone said he had been one of the greatest swordsmen in Westeros, even with one hand. And even he had been defeated by this new threat. A sobering thought. 

Arya slipped back through the crowd, which was beginning to disperse, to where her sister was. She saw that Theon Greyjoy stood beside her, and they spoke quietly together. Sansa’s arm went around him protectively. Arya noticed this immediately and glared in his direction, ready to say something biting, but her sister gave her a warning look, and a slight shake of her head. She chewed her tongue, deciding, for once, not to comment. 

“You saw, then.” said Sansa. 

“He crippled Bran,” she replied instantly.

“He did.”

“So he should be dead, then.”

“Maybe,” said Sansa. She looked more tired than Arya had noticed, and far more worried. “But he still helped us. In the end, he helped us. And he died doing it.”

Arya did not want to think about it. “Was he one of the last ones?”

Sansa nodded, “I think so. It’s almost done.”

“We have to keep burning them.”

She gave her a look. “You don’t need to stay out here all night, you know. There are lots of people helping. You should sleep, while you can.”

“I want to help.”

“Well, you won’t be much help to anyone if you’re exhausted.” There was an edge to her voice. Something else was on her mind.

“What is it?”

“What do you mean?”

“What happened? Why are you worried?”

Theon caught Sansa’s eye and began to drift away towards the door, leaving the sisters alone.

“I’m not worried,” Sansa said with an attempt at composure, “It’s just that…Ser Jaime wasn’t the only surprise, when it comes to the dead.” 

Arya saw the beginnings of tears in her sister’s eyes, and felt another surge of cold fear. “Tell me.”

“It’ll upset you.”

“Tell me.”

Wordlessly, Sansa took her by the arm and led her to a spot near where Jaime’s body lay, that she had not noticed before. 

“We lost Brienne too,” she said quietly.

Brienne of Tarth, the one who had beat The Hound.

It was a blow, a definite blow. Arya felt the clench of something tight around her insides as she looked down at the body. They had laid her sword in her folded hands, like a true warrior. She had been a good fighter. A brave fighter. 

“She tried to help me,” she said, “And I didn’t let her.”

Sansa nodded, eyes still on the dead woman. “Neither did I.”

It wasn’t fair. She’d only been trying to protect them both, and she’d never got to. 

“Someone said that Ser Jaime died trying to protect her,” said Sansa, “She only died a little while after he did.”

“Were they friends?” she wasn’t sure what she thought about that. 

“I think they might have been.”

They were at war. She expected people to die, people she loved. So far she had been lucky. But it was painful still, to see those who had been her protectors vanishing one by one. Her father first, and her mother, her friend Syrio, Yoren… and now Brienne had joined them too. Would The Hound be next? Or Jon, or her sister? True, she had gotten very good at protecting herself. But it was not her life she would fear for.

“She swore an oath to our mother,” said Sansa. “She swore to keep us safe. I think she was proud to see us finally home.”

“I hope so.”

Sansa went to kneel beside the body, heavy cloak rustling in the snow. Gently she closed the woman’s eyes. It did not disguise the fact of death. 

She stood back and looked on for a minute more, than silently squeezed Arya’s shoulder and left her alone. 

Arya wasn’t sure what to do. It didn’t seem right to leave Brienne alone, it didn’t seem honorable. But there was work to be done. She stood for a little while longer, in the drifting snow, both trying to remember the person Brienne of Tarth had been, and trying hard not to remember any of it at all. Especially trying not to think of who she could possibly lose next. Then eventually, she too turned away from that corner of the yard. There was work to be done.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So....I'm sorry about that ending. FYI I do actually like both those characters very much, I just felt like adding some tragedy and neither of them really play a big part in the story I'm telling so they were sacrificed. I'm still sorry. Please don't eat me.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow, an update? impossible!  
> no but seriously guys sorry for the VERY long hiatus, I've been caught up in lots of holiday planning/festivities and also I'm just a slow ass writer. Anyway here is chapter 4, I realized I originally said there would be a lot of Theon in this and then I went on to sort of ignore him so he's back now. And he's just having...such a fun time (remember that wound from chapter 1? Because I sure do) Hope you like hurt/comfort because it's basically this whole chapter. I. Live. For. Angst.

Theon felt as though he might fall any minute, even with Sansa’s arm around his shoulders.

“You shouldn’t have gone outside,” came her voice from somewhere to his left, “You need to stay in the warmth.”

“I’m sorry,” he said through chattering teeth, “I didn’t…didn’t know where anyone had gone…I panicked…” 

He had woken not long after falling asleep to a deep, sharp pain in his arm and the feeling of being surrounded by frigid air. The hall had been largely empty, which was what had scared him. The only people still there were those too badly injured to stand. 

So naturally he had staggered to his feet and gone to the door. They hadn’t been hard to find; most were simply doing their part to help dispose of the bodies. And Sansa had been with them. 

Now she guided him back inside to the hall, to the back where he had slept. He savored even the smallest amount of warmth that her arm around him gave. The cold was unbearable. He tripped over his feet as he walked, stumbling with tiredness.

When they got there he slumped against the wall, shivering. The wound on his arm felt raw and painful, the ache spreading all across his shoulder and down to his fingers. But it could be worse, it could be far worse…he should be out there with the rest of them if he could manage… he shouldn’t have gone back inside…

“I shouldn’t be here,” he mumbled, “The bodies…they need help out there…”

“What you need is to recover,” Sansa said firmly, “You’re really not in good shape, you should have stayed and waited for me.”

“It isn’t that bad.”

“It’s worse than you think.” Her eyes met his. Even with his brain still foggy and muddled he couldn’t help noticing how worried she looked.

“Lie down.”

Slowly, still shaking, he eased himself down to the floor. The flagstones were freezing cold beneath him, even as he huddled in his blankets. If he did manage to get warm, staying so would be an impossible feat. 

Sansa’s hand was at his shoulder, soft and gentle. Her voice sounded a hundred leagues away.

“You’re alright,” she said, “Just rest.”

He didn’t remember falling asleep, but it was dark when he opened his eyes again. Sansa was gone.

It took him a moment to adjust, to realize it must be several hours later than when he’d lain down. He was far too warm for the blankets now, so he pushed them away to lie in the cool night air. Even the heat from the dying fire was too much, he rolled away from the wall to a cooler patch of floor. 

Here it was better, a little, though the heavy warmth still clung to him no matter which way he turned. His heart beat uncomfortably fast and his mind worked in a strange way, sluggishly and rapidly all at once. Each time he tried to calm himself enough to get back to sleep, his thoughts raced around, fitful and anxious. 

It felt as though he was awake for hours, tossing and turning in the heat and the dark. The pain from his wound grew, cutting through his dim thoughts even when he came close to sleep. He lay with his cheek pressed to the stone floor, a welcome relief from the unyielding warmth. 

Eventually he fell back into an uneasy sleep. 

 

When he woke next, there was a pale light in the room, just enough for him to tell that it was near dawn. 

He was covered in cold sweat, and shivering harder than ever. How could he have been so hot, not so long ago? Now his very bones seemed to have frozen. He stretched out his good hand along the floor where he had discarded the blankets, his arm impossibly heavy, but his fingers met nothing.

Panicking slightly, he pushed himself up. Too fast; he was weak and dizzy, the floor seeming to slip out from under him. He inched slowly back to the wall, to the fireplace, and found the thin blankets lying there in a heap. As fast as he could, he wrapped them tight around himself and all but collapsed back to the floor, shaking uncontrollably. 

It took a long time for him to stop trembling, and even then he was still chilled to the bone. Lying on the tilting floor, the whole room felt like a dark void that he was slipping into. Half asleep, he stretched out a trembling arm to cling to the stones, to stop himself from sliding into the endless dark, to hold onto anything steady. He closed his eyes to the darkness, letting his thoughts slip away into the abyss. And all the time the ground was swaying under him…swaying like the deck of a ship…

He dreamed he was on a boat, the water around him freezing even as it rocked the ship from side to side. Everywhere he looked it was only the waves, frozen into peaks…and then they changed into the army of the dead, hundreds of them marching towards him with their cold eyes…he saw his sister among them, even though it was impossible, she was alive, she wasn’t there…but he saw his uncle too, heard both their voices in his head blurring together so he couldn’t tell which was which anymore, so loud he could hear nothing else, until he couldn’t stand it…

The pain in his arm grew very suddenly. His sister’s face swirled, disapproving, in the darkness. Very far away, he thought he heard himself groan.

“Shhh…” 

A voice he knew. He’d heard it before, but couldn’t focus enough to think who it was. The pain grew sharper, he tried to twist away from it and felt a firm hand holding him still. His heart sped up once he felt he was being held down; he didn’t like that, didn’t like it at all, but was too weak to fight against it.

“You’ve got to lie still,” came the voice again, distorted and strange, “You’re alright – I’m sorry if it hurts, I’m trying to be gentle.”

Slowly, with great difficulty, he forced his eyes open. Yara’s face swam above him, frowning…he blinked hard, and the face changed.

Sansa. And she was burning, her whole head was on fire…he blinked again and it was only her hair, red and swirling around her like flames. 

“Don’t try to move,” she said, “I’m changing the bandages on your arm. How does it feel, now?”

It took him a minute to understand what she was asking. The words took a very long time to reach him, as if they were moving through water. He struggled to focus on her face, her voice, the one thing that made sense in the spinning world. 

“Hurts,” was all he managed to get out. Something else mingled with the aching; a tight, scratchy feeling. “It itches,” he added, “Feels hot.”

“You feel hot? Or is it only your arm?”

“Just the arm.” He closed his eyes again, in an effort to make the room stop spinning. Vaguely he wished she would stop asking him things. 

“Are you cold? You’re shivering.”

“It’s… very cold…”

She brought her hand to his forehead, frowning in concern. 

“It’s the fever,” she said, “You’re burning up, I should get the maester… you need medicine-“

“No…it’s fine. Don’t bother him, I don’t need anything…”

“Theon-“

“I’m fine. Don’t worry, please don’t worry. I’m fine.” It wasn’t fair, for her to worry about him. And he would be alright, he had been much worse. 

Theon felt the faint tugging of Sansa wrapping the rest of his arm, pulling the sleeve back down to his wrist. The wound burned. She tucked the blanket back around him, still he felt very cold but was too tired to do anything about it. All he could do was lie weakly on his side, shivering a little, still very aware of the itching and tenderness under the bandages but unable to make himself completely aware of much else. The bodies outside came back to him…the dead…their faces swirling…

“Sansa,” he said, startled by his own voice. 

“I’m still here, what is it?”

He wasn’t sure…he couldn’t remember…it was hard to put it into words, not when he was distracted by the cold and pain…

“I’m sorry about Brienne,” he managed. 

Silence. He’d upset her. He hadn’t meant to, but it had just come to him, he felt like he ought to say something…he hadn’t meant to make it worse…

“That’s alright.” Her voice shook a little. “She fought very bravely.”

He fought to speak sensibly through the fever. “She was your friend. I’m sorry. I never thanked her…for helping you after I left…I’m sorry…” If only his thoughts weren’t so foggy, he could comfort her better. He owed her that much, at least. 

“I owe you,” he mumbled, knowing it wouldn’t make sense to her, “I still owe you…” 

She shushed him again, brushing his hair back from his forehead. He struggled to stay alert, keeping his eyes on her face. “I’m sorry. I should have been there…I never should have left you…” Tears stung his eyes. 

Sansa shook her head. “Don’t. You don’t need to think about that now. I just want you to rest, alright? Don’t worry about anything. I’ll look after you, can you let me do that? Just let me take care of you. Everything will be alright.”

She looked so scared, even as she continued brushing the damp hair from his eyes. He hated to see her like that. If he could stay awake with her…but he was so tired. His limbs were so heavy he felt he might never lift them again.

Eventually his eyes shut on their own and he drifted for a while…before shaking himself back from the threshold of sleep, heart racing. He couldn’t go to sleep. He knew what was coming if he did. If he slept, he would dream again, and it would be so much worse than anything in the waking world. 

So every time he felt himself fading away again, he fought his way back to the surface. He couldn’t close his eyes. He couldn’t, no matter how heavy they were. 

“Theon,”

She sounded miles and miles away…swimming somewhere above the surface of his consciousness. He lifted his eyes again, as much as he could manage, to look into hers. They were so, so blue…

“Don’t try to stay awake. You’re not well, you need to heal.” She paused. “I’ll be right here with you.”

She was right. As much as he feared what dreams might come to him, he was far too tired to struggle any longer. Distantly he felt her lift his head an inch or so and slip something under it, some folded cloth. It was the slightest bit more comfortable. 

Sansa’s voice continued, speaking softly and kindly but beyond the edge of hearing as he slipped under the waves again, and floated. 

His dreams were worse than reality. Worse, they were so vivid they mingled unsettlingly with wakefulness, until he wasn’t sure what was what.

He saw the army again, hundreds and hundreds of them, rows upon rows…all of them bearing down on him. But when he turned to run, all he saw was Ramsay’s laughing face. Knives tore at his skin. He saw Sansa, pacing the floors of her room in Winterfell, her face thin and sunken. When he tried to reach her he found his arms too feeble to lift, or else tied down, he couldn’t tell. His whole body ached, so much that he could only have been beaten, but couldn’t remember when or how…the walls around him were cold as ice, a cold he could not escape, and voices were loud in his ears but said nothing that made any sense. And all the while the frozen army kept marching, forever marching…

A pale hand reached out from the darkness, lifting something to his lips. He groaned and turned his head away, but the hand followed and made him swallow. Water. He drank as much as he could and then felt his head being placed back to the ground. 

The floor tipped and swayed beneath him. He was faintly aware that he ached, and his throat cracked with dryness. Voices were all around. Dimly he wondered why he could not lift his arms. Thinking he must be tied up again, he tried to fight against the bonds but couldn’t find the strength. He felt hot all over. A voice said something unintelligible and a cool hand rested on his cheek, before he was pulled into sleep once more. 

A few times after that he came close to wakefulness, close enough to hear distant voices or get shadowy glimpses of his surroundings. Sometimes he thought he was in his room in Pyke where he had slept as a child, but it was dark and freezing, cold water dripping from the walls. Other times it was the kennels at Winterfell.

Once he felt he was back on the battlefield, suffocating under a pile of corpses, he tried to move or cry out, but no one heard. The bodies burned, and he felt the heat blister his skin. He woke up shuddering, drenched in sweat, his arm so sore he could pay attention to nothing else. He could not make himself stop sobbing. 

Days might have passed, or years, while he swam through his dark dreams and slipped in and out of consciousness. He could not think where he was, or how he had gotten there, or who he was with. All he knew was that his arm hurt too badly to lift. Faces swirled above him; his father’s, his sister’s, Robb’s. Burning tears came to his eyes again, he tried to call out, to tell his friend how sorry he was, but his voice didn’t seem to work. He squeezed his eyes shut, hoping it would just go away, blow away on the wind… 

Sometimes it was Sansa’s face that hovered above him, and that was the worst. She screamed down at him, her clothes torn, face covered with cuts, calling him a traitor, a murderer…and he sobbed out that she was right, that he was sorry, he was all the things she said. But then she changed, her face more frightened than angry, her words softer and it didn’t make sense…she had been right when she yelled those things…now she only sat by him and stroked his hair, and he wept because he knew he did not deserve any of it. She shouldn’t be here, with him. Something ice cold touched his forehead, and he did not have the strength to turn away. 

Still the ship’s deck swayed beneath him…his sister shook him roughly, telling him to get up…but he couldn’t move and she faded away like smoke…he was tied to that cross again, or lying on the dungeon floor, he couldn’t tell, and he was so thirsty…he wasn’t sure if he begged out loud for water but someone brought it, holding a cup to his lips as he tried to drink through the shaking. 

More cold. He thought he saw lights from a fire somewhere but whether or not he dreamed it he had no idea. 

Somebody’s face, flickering between that of his mother’s and Yara’s second in command. Something else at his mouth, a spoon, he drank something bitter.

More pain, his arm burst into flames in front of his eyes. Someone was screaming, a long, drawn out wail that carried on through dreams and waking…he cried too, wanting nothing more than for it to stop…he rolled over to where the floor was mercifully cool and the crying filled his head…there was snow all around him and tall, dark shadows…

Trees. He was in the woods. The woods at night…trees creaking in the wind…why was he lying down, he should be running, shouldn’t he? He was running, someone was coming and everything would be worse if they caught him. It was cold, so cold. And beside him was…

“Sansa.” His voice was astonishingly loud in his ears. Her face was a white blur, swinging above him like a pendulum. Why was she here? Had they found her? No…no, they’d escaped…she’d gone home. But she was here, here with her blue eyes and hair like flames, swaying above him. Here in the woods…

“We have to go,” he croaked, “They’re coming…they’re coming back…” 

With a massive effort, he pushed himself up on his elbows. The world turned sideways and he almost fell down again. Sansa held onto his arm. Why didn’t she look afraid? They had to leave, they would be caught…

“It’s alright, Theon. Nobody’s coming for us. You’re safe.” 

His head was swimming. “No…we have to go north…the Boltons…” That was who it was, of course. 

“Shhh. Theon, please lie down, you’re just going to make it worse.”

He let her push him back to the ground, too weak to protest, and lay shivering all over. 

“They’re coming,” he said, half in tears, “They’re coming. They’ll hurt you.” He couldn’t bear it, not her, not her too…the things they would do to her…

Another voice came in, a man’s voice, one he might have known but couldn’t remember. 

“What’s he saying?”

“Nothing. He’s just confused, it’s his fever.”

Who was confused? Who else was with them? He tried to talk to her again but only managed a groan. 

“It’s alright,” he heard her say, “You’re safe. It’s just a dream…you’re only dreaming…that’s all it is…just a bad dream.”

Only dreaming. It couldn’t be, not when it felt so real. He couldn’t think, and if he couldn’t think he couldn’t run, couldn’t protect her. If they were caught it would be all his fault, how could he be so weak? He owed her…he had to be her protector, as he had to be Yara’s…

A cold cloth wiped his face. He rolled over on his makeshift pillow, head aching. It would be his fault if they caught her…all his fault…he tried to tell he was sorry, sorry he could do his job. Maybe he did, it was hard to tell if he actually spoke outside his mind or not.

Eventually, the horrible dream faded. 

More came after, ones he couldn’t understand or was only half aware of. He tasted the bitter medicine again, felt his wound twinge. Waves of hot and cold came one after another, sometimes all at once so that he rolled around fitfully, shivering one minute and sweating the next. All he longed for was sleep that was not restless…

 

Slowly, time seeming to creep by at a snail’s pace, his awareness returned. 

For a while he slipped in and out, consciousness ebbing and flowing like the tide. He might have been dreaming again, or dead.

Eventually, a few vague pieces of reality came to him; he was lying on the floor somewhere, and everything hurt. He tried to open his eyes and couldn’t. Some warm, heavy weight lay over him. There had been dreams…so much noise in his head…but it was quiet now, almost peaceful.   
With every ounce of strength he had, he dragged his eyelids open. There were stone walls, a fire. Cold flagstones beneath him.

A sudden fear took hold of him; he was in that dungeon again. How long had he been here? How had they found him, where had they taken him from? But no…no, the ceiling was all wrong. He blinked, and it wasn’t a dungeon at all. The great hall at Winterfell. The panic faded. Too tired to try and remember how he had got there, he rolled onto his other side and shut his eyes again. He felt shivery and feverish, but the pain had faded to a dull ache. He only remembered it when he rolled onto his bad arm. The room faded from his sight, darkness taking him once more.

The frightening, disturbed dreams ceased after that, but still he remained far too tired to wake properly. Voices came and went, sometimes faces he thought he recognized hovered above him. Once his head was lifted and he was given more water. He caught snatches of conversation, perhaps about him, saw flashes of boots, cloaks. Each time he came close to the surface he clung to it, fighting to stay conscious but always slipping away again. It seemed an age before he had the energy not to.

When he finally, properly woke up, he first thing he was aware of was the darkness. It was late, or early; no light came through his eyelids. There was quiet in the hall. 

He could feel the warmth of a blanket wrapped around him, the breath slow in his chest, and more than anything the aches that covered his body. He was exhausted, feeble…but he was alive. He was alive. 

It took a very long time, but eventually he pried his eyes open. Even that tired him; the thought of just rolling over, let alone standing up, was daunting. 

He was still lying in the great hall. The same clusters of wounded people who had been there when he first arrived were still there now, which puzzled him. Certainly their injuries ought to have healed, or killed them, by now? Surely it had been several days since he was last fully conscious, or it at least felt that long.

He closed his eyes again, trying to piece together all that had happened, the weariness that ran all the way to his bones making it difficult to think. He’d had a fever from the wound, that was obvious now. And had dreamed things he had no interest in remembering. 

Thoughts moved sluggishly through his mind, none of them really sticking. Most were unpleasant. But he was alive…that was the only thought he forced himself to cling to. Somehow, he was still alive. 

He had begun to fall back into a doze when he was jolted back to wakefulness by the sound of soft footsteps. Fabric rustled near his head as he felt someone kneel beside him. Slowly, because his body did not yet seem to want to respond properly, he turned his head to look. 

Sansa’s eyes widened when she saw him looking. “Theon?” she said hesitantly, “Are you… awake?”

Not sure if he had the strength to talk, Theon nodded. The worried expression on her face softened and she brought her wrist to his forehead. Only when her skin touched his did he realize he was drenched in sweat again. 

“How do you feel?” she asked, still looking concerned. 

“Tired,” he said, sounding as if he had swallowed nails, “I’ve been worse. But – tired.” It hurt to talk. Just moving his mouth was nearly exhausting. 

Sansa looked sympathetic, but relieved. “I’m sure you must be. It might take a while for you to get your strength back.” 

He wasn’t surprised. Every ounce of strength seemed to have been leeched from him. 

She had a damp cloth in her hand, and he did not protest when she gently began wiping the sweat from his face. He could not help noticing that her hand shook as she did so

“You scared me,” she said, not looking at him. “You have no idea how anxious I’ve been.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t you dare be sorry!You’ve been very ill, I don’t want you apologizing for that. Turn your head.” 

With some difficulty, he turned his head further to the side and let her sponge the back of his neck.

“Do you…I’m sorry…do you have any water?” He hated to ask her for anything, but his mouth was so dry he didn’t think he could stand it another minute.

“Of course, I’ll bring it to you.”

“No – I can get it.” He wasn’t sure if he would be able to, feeble as he was, but it was worth offering.

“You stay here,” she said firmly.

She rose, leaving the cloth draped across his neck. Soon she returned with a cup of water; Theon tried to reach for it but his arm shook terribly with both the effort and sudden removal from the blanket. Sansa gently pushed it down and slipped her own arm beneath his shoulders. “Here. Let me help you.” 

Too drained and in undeniable need of help to feel any embarrassment from it, he allowed her to prop him up against the wall. He had to close his eyes briefly when he came upright to get rid of the black spots that popped suddenly in front of them. Sansa’s arm around him was warm, and he was very glad of the support. If she were to let go, he doubted he would be able to hold himself up for long. He had misjudged how weak he truly was; just sitting up had him dizzy and shaking all over. 

Sansa lifted the cup to his mouth, helping him drink. He made to take it in his own hands, but they shook so badly he nearly dropped it. Once again, the cool water alone made him feel surprisingly better. 

She eased him back to the floor, and he shivered uncontrollably even after she had pulled the blankets back around him. The brief removal of them had made him even more aware of the cold sweat on his back, still freezing and uncomfortably damp. That faint, sick feeling he’d had coming into the hall so long ago was back, though this time he hoped it was merely the weakness that came with recovery. 

“How long?” he croaked, as loud as he could manage. Sansa turned back to him. She was ringing out the cloth in a bowl of water. 

“A day,” she said, not having to ask what he meant, “You all came back yesterday, last night. This morning I started to worry…you were really unwell. I got the maester to look at you, he had to give you medicine. Do you…remember any of that?”

Theon recalled the bitter taste in his mouth, and maybe the hovering face of an old man. “A little.”

“We’ve been trying to take the fever down all day, but now it seems like it’s broken, thankfully. I was really worried about you,” her voice shook as she spoke, “There were a few times when I…”

She broke off, shaking her head. “You seem much better now.”

“I feel better than I did. Was it really only a day?” The distant, foggy memory he had of Sansa looking after him felt like a week ago, at the least.

“Only that.”

“It felt… much longer.”

She reached out as if to touch him, then thought better of it and closed her hand in a fist. He pretended not to notice. 

“I need to look at your arm,” she said abruptly. With some difficulty, he untangled it from the heavy cover. Sansa gently stripped off the old bandage, examining it carefully. He braced himself for the awful burning, but it did not come. It was still sore and painful, but not to the degree he had expected.

“The swelling’s gone down,” she said, sounding relieved, “It looks a lot better.” 

She washed it clean and then began applying the new bandages. She shook her head as she worked, frowning. 

“This should have been treated right away. It’s no wonder infection got in, if you were out there for hours without it being looked at. Or you should have been able to at least rest somewhere cleaner than the floor, if only we had room…”

Theon wasn’t listening. He had just realized something – the heavy blanket that had been thrown over him…

“Sansa,” he said, “This…is this your cloak?”

She paused, looking up. “It is. No – you keep it for now, I want you to be warm.”

“You should take it back. You’ll need it, you should never have…”

“I’m alright, don’t worry about me.” For some reason, she looked embarrassed. “You…you kept saying you were cold…I just wanted to make you more comfortable.”

At first he wondered what she meant, and then a cold, heavy weight dropped into the pit of his stomach. He didn’t want to know, but was propelled by a morbid curiosity. 

“I said that?”

She was avoiding his eye. “Yes.”

A hot prickle of shame and embarrassment had begun in his chest. What kind of things had he said to her? Had he cried out in his sleep, admitting things he never intended anyone to hear, or worse? 

“What…what else did I say?”

Sansa looked uncomfortable. “Well…all sorts of things. A lot of it didn’t make any sense at all. Nothing particularly alarming,” she added gently, catching his worried look, “Mostly just…nonsense. Things from your dreams. And you…you called for your sister sometimes. Or…or me.” 

Her face went slightly pink, but she went on. “I was right there with you, but you didn’t seem to know that, no matter how much I told you. You were so scared, and I didn’t know what to do…I thought I was going to lose you…” she trailed off, looking away. Theon was startled to see tears in her eyes. 

“It’s my fault,” she said, “I should have gotten you help as soon as you came in, made sure you had medicine, I shouldn’t have just left you…”

Alarm replacing embarrassment, Theon shook his head. “It’s not your fault. Don’t say that. The battle was just over when I came in, and there were people hurt worse than me. There wasn’t much to be done.”

“Still…”

“I’m alright,” he said as firmly as he could with his weakened voice, “It’s alright now. Don’t worry.”

“You weren’t alright. It’s a miracle you’re alive now at all.”

“Maybe. But it’s not your fault, don’t…don’t do that. You helped me. You did nothing but help. Thank you.”

He said this last part with as much earnestness as he could manage. “Sansa – thank you. You didn’t need to help me. I might have died if you hadn’t.”

Sansa abruptly took his hand in her own, holding it tight. “I couldn’t lose you,” she whispered, “Not after Brienne, after…everything else. I couldn’t lose you too.”

“You haven’t. Not yet.”

Her thumb was gently rubbing the palm of his hand in circles. Theon wondered if she realized she was doing it. 

“Can you promise me,” she said, her voice still a little thick, “that you’ll…try not to die? I know it sounds stupid, but please, Theon, can you promise me that? Whatever happens next, whatever you have to do…try to come back. Please.”

He swallowed hard. The weight of the future, of everything that came next, seemed impossible to survive, even if he tried. He could tell by her face that she knew it too. But he had wanted to swear loyalty of some kind to her for a very long time. If this was his chance, then so be it.

“I promise.”

Inexplicably, she bent to kiss his forehead. Theon said nothing, though the small, gentle gesture sent his thoughts reeling. Her hand released his then, but the warmth of it would linger until long after she was gone.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. I'll admit this whole thing is...not going as well as I'd planned it. I'm thinking this will be the second to last chapter, and then I'll just be done with it because honestly it's stopped making sense and I'm kind of angry at it. If you have enjoyed your time with this little story, I'm glad it made you happy and I'm sorry to end it so abruptly. Have fun with the final two chapters(last one should be up soonish...at least within less of a time than it took to post this chapter lol)  
> Here we check out Sansa's thoughts for the first time.

Outside the walls of Winterfell, the western sky slowly turned darker than ink. The wind over the trees hissed, cold as the ice below, sounding like a cruel whisper. The whisper of things that grew in places where nothing should. Yet another long night had begun.

For now at least, Sansa Stark felt she was safe within the thick walls. She would always feel safest here, no matter what dangers lay outside. This place was her strength. She could not bring herself to consider that eventually the day may come when she would not feel that sense of security she always had at Winterfell, when even her home would not be able to protect her. That would be the day she was truly alone. 

It was the second night since the first battle against the dead, and one question remained at the forefront of all their minds; the location of the rest of the army. The masses the Bran had seen, that he had alerted them about in the days before had yet to be seen by the rest of them; those that had already been driven away were barely a fraction of the total numbers. Why were they waiting? What was their plan? It would have been better, perhaps, if it all had happened at once. This waiting was the worst part of it all. No one had thought it would come in waves like this. 

Seated on the edge of her bed, Sansa pressed her hands over her eyes. It was very late, but despite her own tiredness and Arya’s insisting that she rest, she could not sleep. She had tried, but had been unable to manage more than a few minutes at a time. Even had the whole castle not been on edge, anticipating another attack at any moment, she would not have been able to rest. Sleep did not often come easy to her. 

The quiet made it worse; with most of the survivors gathered in the great hall, or stationed guard outside if they were able, the rest of the castle seemed cold and empty. Sansa was used to the sounds of people going about their business in the various parts of Winterfell, used to the bustle of daily life. This uneasy stillness made it seem as though everyone and everything around her was dead, and she was the only living thing for miles.

Now she did the only thing she could think of to clear her mind of the unpleasant thoughts; get up and walk. She paced the confines of her room, watching her shadow creep up and down the walls. With every step she struggled to get rid of the foul thoughts that crowded her mind; the piles of bodies crowding the yard, the view of the dead army she’d seen marching toward her home from the window, Brienne’s blank eyes, Theon crying out to her in his sleep…and above all the unrelenting terror of not knowing what was possibly going to happen next. 

She mentally shook herself as an all too familiar tightness rose in her throat, focusing on now. The past was the past, and nothing could be done about it. All she had to do now was move forward. Keep moving forward with as much strength as she could manage. The tears could wait.

Sleep could wait too, it seemed. She wasn’t some silly child anymore, standing by and weeping for all that she had lost while more horrors raged around her. She was the Lady of Winterfell. And there had to be something she could do apart from sit and worry in her chamber. 

The corridors beyond her room were largely devoid of any people. All around her the stone walls pressed in, though not uncomfortably, almost like an embrace. She thought of her sister, standing with the watch outside. That was where she would go; to be with her. Even just standing and waiting outside felt better than standing and waiting in here; at least then she felt she was doing something helpful. 

On her way outside, however, she paused at the door to the great hall. Theon was in there, tired and hurt, as were others. She wouldn’t want to disturb his rest, or anyone else’s, but perhaps it would stop her worrying to check on him once, to make sure…

Quietly, she opened the side door and crept into the hall. It was calmer in here than it had been the past day and night before; there were no more cries of the dying and wounded, just the slow breathing of a room full of very tired people. And her own footsteps, sharply punctuated in the otherwise dense quiet. 

The light from the fire at the end was dim, but enough that Sansa could make out the dark shapes along the floor. At the end of the hall she found what she was looking for, a small, thin figure huddled under her cloak by the fire. 

Theon was still sleeping when she reached him, his breathing slow and steady. He seemed – and she hoped he was – undisturbed. By the light of the fire she saw that a bit of color had come back into his face, but not much. She knelt by him, touching his forehead gently. It was still clammy, but cool, with no trace of any fever. 

Relieved slightly by this knowledge, she thought it best to leave him. Further examination of his hurt arm could wait until morning. Although she did sit with him a moment longer, simply watching his chest rise and fall. He looked younger in sleep, and calmer, his face bearing no creases of pain or worry. 

She was rising to leave when he stirred slightly, making her pause in fear of waking him. Despite her efforts, his eyes opened and flickered around the room for a moment before landing on her. There was fear in them at first, but then recognition sank in. 

“Sansa,” he said, blinking wearily, “Is something wrong?”

“No, go back to sleep. I was just checking on you, I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

He shuffled slowly to one side, wincing slightly. “It’s alright. Don’t worry.”

She tucked the cloak tighter around him as his eyes shut again. 

“Take your cloak back,” he murmured, “I don’t need it.”

She did not need it either, at the moment. She’d dug out another one of hers before she came down, the blue one she had made at Castle Black. It felt heavy and overly formal around her shoulders, but it would do. 

“Keep it until morning. I’ll be back for you then, you just sleep for now.”

Sansa took it as a sign of his exhaustion that he did not protest. 

She figured, while she was there, that she ought to visit the rest of the injured as well. Most were asleep, but she made her rounds anyway, giving water or words of comfort to those that were awake. After doing it for a day and two nights, she had already grown used to tending wounds, and making sure the people who had them were kept as comfortable as possible. The sight of gory injuries too, had become something it was necessary for her to be accustomed to. And the constant underlying tremor of worry, that as well was quickly becoming a familiar feeling.

Once she was certain she had seen to everyone in the hall, Sansa made her way to the outer courtyard. She leaned against the stone wall for a moment, taking deep breaths of the night air. Even though a day had passed since the first bodies were retrieved and disposed of, she could still smell the lingering smoke, the burning flesh. It made her faintly sick to think about, so she pushed it to the back of her mind. Now was all that mattered. Not yesterday, not tomorrow. 

She found Arya on the battlements, silhouetted in torchlight. She was stock-still, watching the silent moors beyond.

“If you’re here to try to make me come back inside, it won’t work,” she said without turning around, “I’m staying out here for as long as I need to.”  
“I’m not going to try. I don’t recall ever being able to make you do anything.”

Her sister turned, frowning suspiciously. “You’re the one who should go back and rest. You look terrible.”

“Thank you,” said Sansa, going to stand beside her. 

“How long has it been since you’ve slept?”

“How long has it been since you have? I don’t think a good night’s sleep is something any of us will be getting for a while. We might as well be useful while we can.”

“I don’t feel very useful,” said Arya tensely, “We aren’t doing anything; we can’t fight, we can’t run, we’re just waiting.” She paused, her face a knot of hidden emotions. “I hate it. I hate doing nothing.”

“I hate it too. It’s bad enough that this is happening here, now. But it’s worse when there’s nothing to be done.”

Arya impatiently kicked the rampart in front of her, and Sansa was suddenly reminded of the feisty, rowdy little girl she had once been. It would be good, so good, if only for a day they could all go back to the way they were before. She had a faint, fleeting hope that maybe now she could stand with her sister and not think of what was coming, and only remember.

But that was a child’s hope, she knew. Remembering hurt. And it helped no one. 

“How is the queen?” asked Arya.

“Better.” Daenerys had woken up the previous night, and was slowly but surely regaining her strength. Sansa could not help but admire the woman’s determination. 

“Jon’s ecstatic then, I guess,” said Arya with a slight smirk.

“He’s very grateful,” said Sansa, smiling a little herself. Her initial annoyance at her brother for giving up their kingdom to a woman he had only just met had faded with time; there were more pressing issues to deal with. And the two women had warmed to each other, out of necessity if not anything else. They were at war, they could not afford to waste time fighting amongst themselves. And their losses had already been so great. The more ties they kept, the better. 

“Arya…have you seen your friend since the battle?” Sansa wasn’t sure she wanted to know, with all the deaths she had no desire to have her sister relay yet another painful one. 

“What friend?” she replied rather sharply. 

“The blacksmith. The one Jon knew from Dragonstone.”

“Gendry?” She looked away, deliberately not meeting her sister’s eye. “No, I haven’t. Why?”

“I just…I hope he made it. You two seemed very close.”

Arya gave her a stern look. 

“I’m not making fun of you,” she said gently, “I’m really not. But I’m tired of our family losing people that we love, and I wouldn’t want to lose another.”  
Arya made no comment, but Sansa could see the carefully concealed pain and worry behind her eyes. Cautiously, she laid a hand on her shoulder. She took it as a good sign that her little sister did not move away. 

“There’s still me, though, no matter what,” she said. “We need to stay together. We’re survivors, the both of us, and we’re still here. And if it’s at all possible, I won’t let anything happen to you.”

The look on Arya’s face was impossible to read. Even when they were children, she had been able to make her face a mask when she needed to.   
“That’s not your job,” she said, “You don’t need to protect me.”

“I can try,” she said rather desperately. She was the older sister. No matter how good Arya could get with a blade, it was always she that would feel the need to protect. Even if she knew it to be hopeless.

Arya shook her head with a small, sad smile. “No. I can look after myself. And you can look after yourself. We’ll both need to learn to if we’re going to survive at all. You’re right, we need to stick together, but when it comes to protecting each other…there’s only so much either of us can do at this point. I could be dead tomorrow, and there isn’t anything you can do to stop that, no matter what you try.”

“Don’t say that.”

“It’s the truth. And I could try to protect you…but what’s coming isn’t something that we can be protected from for long. It doesn’t matter who does it.”  
She stared back out at the moors again, silent. Sansa tried to think of what to say, unsure of whether to comfort her or challenge her. But she had spoken again before she could open her mouth.

“Brienne tried to protect me.” Her voice was quieter now. “And you, too. Father tried to protect us, back in King’s Landing. And our mother, and our brother, and all of them died. I had friends who-“ she broke off, shaking her head. Sansa felt a slight curiosity. Since returning home, her sister had very rarely talked about her many travels, as Sansa had rarely talked about hers. It became an unspoken agreement between them not to ask.

“Which friends?” she asked cautiously.

Arya was quiet for a moment, as if deciding whether to ignore her or not. 

“There was a woman in Braavos,” she said, “An actor. I thought I’d made a friend, but then they just killed her, too. And if it hadn’t been for me they never would have done it.” 

She seemed to be speaking half to herself. Sansa was not entirely sure who ‘they’ were, or how close this woman had actually got to her sister, but she understood the feeling all too well. 

“It seems like everyone who’s tried to help us has ended up dead.”

Sansa thought of Theon, back in the great hall. And of Tyrion, and Sandor Clegane, and Arya’s blacksmith friend. And Jon, their own brother.

“Not all of them,” she said quietly. 

Arya said nothing. It was hard, so hard to try to make her sister still have hope when she hardly had any left herself. 

The wind picked up suddenly, making the torch flames shudder and spark dangerously. Sansa drew her cloak tighter around her. She remembered being thirteen, standing at her window and looking out over this same stretch of land and watching the king’s host arrive at Winterfell. At the time, she had hoped eagerly that her life would change. That she was going to be whisked away by a handsome prince and have everything she ever wanted, like in the stories. Well, her life certainly had changed that day, but since then she had only ever wished it could go back to the way it had been. Her life had not been the kind of story she had always dreamed of. But it was not over yet. 

“Do you remember the feast, the night King Robert came?” she asked softly.

Arya’s mouth turned up a little. “I remember throwing food at you and spoiling your pretty dress.”

That brought a smile to Sansa’s face as well. It felt good to smile again, even over something small. “Of course you did. I’d almost forgotten about that.”

She tried to think of more to say, but there wasn’t anything. So they stood silently together, neither having any desire to continue conversation. For a moment Sansa was almost able to forget, forget everything, and it was simply peaceful.

“Arya?” 

Sansa turned around. She looked at her sister, and seeing that her face had gone blank again and her eyes wide with shock, turned to the young man behind them who had spoken. Tall, dark haired…it was that friend of hers. Robert Baratheon’s bastard. 

He turned uncertainly to Sansa, inclined his head. “Didn’t mean to disturb you, m’lady.”

“What are you doing here?” Arya said sharply. 

“Came to find you. I’ve been out on the field, taking care of – “

“I thought you were dead.”

Sansa caught something more than anger in her sister’s voice. The two of them were staring intently at one another, seemingly forgetting she was there with them. 

The young man glanced at her apprehensively, “Well…I thought you might be, too. That’s why I went looking for you.” His voice became suddenly gentler, “I was worried. I wanted to make sure nothing had happened to you.”

There was nothing gentle about Arya’s voice, however. “Why couldn’t you have done that in the first place, if it mattered so much? I’ve been waiting a night and a day for you; what in the seven hells has taken you this long?”

Seeing that this conversation could soon become much more personal, Sansa politely cleared her throat. Both heads snapped to her immediately.   
“I’ll leave the two of you,” she said, amused. She gave Arya a knowing look that was responded to with only a glare.

As she made her way back along the walkway, she could hear what sounded distinctly like her sister’s raised voice from back the way she had come. She couldn’t help smiling a little; knowing Arya, her anger at the boy would be fierce but short. It did give her a slight pang, though, to see them together. Before, Jon had had Daenerys and Bran had been…whatever he was now, but she and her sister had at least had each other. But now, judging by how Arya had looked at that other boy…perhaps she was leaving too. Brienne had been Sansa’s friend, her protector, but now even she was gone. They were all leaving, one by one…

The halls were silent as her feet carried her back to her own room, thoughts wandering again. Too many of them; too many thoughts floating around in her head, and none of them pleasant. She needed distraction, but had no idea of where it could come from. 

Ahead of her, she saw a dim sliver of light from one of the rooms – the door was ajar. Curious, she went to it. Inside a fire had been lit in the grate, silhouetting a seated figure. Bran. 

“Sansa,” he said, without looking at her. “Arya and Jon told you to rest tonight.”

She could not help still being slightly unnerved by her brother’s ability to know things like that. “They did. I couldn’t sleep, so I’m just…wandering.”

He looked at her for the first time, though his eyes retained a rather distant look. “You aren’t the only one,” he said, “The castle is unsettled. We’re all waiting, caught in the breath before the last wave. But not for long…the tension will break soon enough…” He trailed off, glancing away from her again. 

Sansa’s breath caught in her throat when she realized what he was talking about.

“Bran, have you…seen them? Did you see where the army is now?” 

He nodded slowly. “They are beyond the forest. He sent the first wave as a distraction, the next will be far worse. They will come from the west.”

A cold trickle of panic slid into her chest. “When did you see this? Why are you only telling me now?”

“I saw it tonight,” he said with that same eerie calmness, “I was going to tell Sam, but he left around an hour ago. You’re the first person I’ve seen since then.”

“What do we do? How do we prepare for them?”

Bran was silent for a long moment. “There’s no way to be ready,” he said quietly, “Not truly. All we can do is the same things we’ve been doing, defend the castle with what we have. But we can never be ready. We were not ready for the first wave, and we will not be ready for the second.”

Sansa’s mouth was very dry. This was it; this was how it ended, for good or ill. 

She came to stand in front of her brother. “Bran,” she said, forcing herself to sound calm, “Bran, what do we do? What can I do? Is there really…nothing?”

He stared back up at her, calm, thoughtful. She could not help searching his face for any signs of the little boy she remembered, however small. 

“Tell the others,” he said. “You have done all you can. Now all we can do is hope. There is still hope, though it may not seem like it.” 

He was right; there was very little to be hopeful for. Sansa fought to swallow her panic, to think. 

“They’ve all been ready to get back to fighting at a moment’s notice,” she said, more to herself than to her brother, “We’ll just have to make sure everyone is where they need to be, that they’re prepared…” And then…what? Fight an army they had no idea if they could match or not, with a good portion of their men dead or wounded from the first wave? 

“It will not be tomorrow,” said Bran, “I cannot tell the hour or exactly, but it will be in the night. You have time to prepare – as much as you can.”

They had time. They had time. 

“Alright,” she said, fighting to keep her voice steady, to seem put together. She was the Lady of Winterfell. “I’ll have to – tell the others then?”

Bran’s dark eyes fixed on her, more awareness in them than she had seen in a long time. “Tell the others,” he agreed.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so here it is, the final chapter. I know it's kind of a lame ending but in all honesty I just wanted to finish this story off. It really wasn't what I hoped it would be and I don't really want to deal with it anymore. And I know tomorrow will kill me so I really wanted it done by then because I likely won't have the motivation afterwards lol  
> I've gone full Theonsa with this chapter because I have no self control  
> Enjoy

“The army is currently somewhere west of here, in the forest or beyond. They will be here tomorrow night or next; we have time to prepare ourselves but need to work quickly, there’s no doubt that their numbers will be greater than what we have seen yet.”

Jon’s words slipped through Theon’s mind, numbing it. A cold kind of dread had settled in his stomach the moment he and Sansa had come to the front of the hall, faces grim. He had known there was some new development…and it would be nothing good. 

Daenerys stood with them as well. She looked as exhausted as he felt, but was standing tall. 

“Any person who is able will need to be at the walls, defending the castle. Those who are too badly wounded will go to the crypts with the rest that are unable to fight.”

The crypts. Theon would never feel right down there, no matter the circumstances. He would rather fight, he would make himself do so. 

“If they do breach the gates,” said Sansa, “We may need to evacuate the castle. The crypts are only safe if they remain outside the walls, once they get in there’s nothing stopping them from killing everyone here.”

At once, a series of uncertain murmurs rippled through the hall. Theon wondered the same things he heard them all saying; where would they go? How could they possibly escape in the midst of a battle between the living and the dead? And what would happen if they could not get to a safer stronghold in time?

Even Daenerys seemed confused. “Evacuate to where?” she said, “What place could be safer from them than here?”

Several voices from the crowd mimicked the same question. This time it was Jon who answered. 

“Somewhere further south,” he said, “There are other families that would likely take you in. Eventually it would be ideal if you could get as far as White Harbor, possibly take a ship somewhere else. The very old and the very young, those unable to fight…this is not your war. If it comes to evacuating, don’t try to stay behind. If we lose the fight up here…there needs to at least be someone left to tell the rest of the kingdoms what’s happened here. That will be your job, if we lose and you escape. Use us as your example. The dead are coming, and they will not stop with the North.”

Silence, rather than mutterings, greeted this new and ominous statement. Theon felt a chill hit him as he thought, truly considered the reality that they might lose. The North destroyed, their whole army slaughtered and little hope for the rest of the world…it had always been a possibility but never before now had he understood how great that possibility was. 

“I know for many of you this has been your home your whole life,” Jon continued, “And I know you would be reluctant to leave it. But if it’s clear that we are losing the war, there is no point in staying. So if you cannot fight, we will be moving you to the crypts as soon as we spot the army. And if it looks like they are going to get inside…you’ll need to leave. I won’t let innocent people die here if there can be another way.”

Jon looked sternly at his audience, as if daring someone to challenge him. No one did. 

“We start preparations soon, then. We’ll need people to man the outer walls, archers especially. Defense is our priority now, not attack. It’s them that will be coming at us.”

Some of the assembled began grabbing weapons, heading to their stations. Theon sat where he was, not knowing what to do next. If they were going out to fight again, if they were needed now, he had to join them. He could not sit here any longer. His arm was getting better, slowly but steadily; surely he would be deemed well enough to join the battle? 

Not that all of him wanted to. When he thought of the haunting way the dead army had advanced on them with no emotion, no thought but destruction, when he thought of the piles of bodies in the snow and knew every second that he could be the next one...thinking of the last wave made his very blood seem to freeze. But others were rejoining. Others were doing their part…so long as he was able, there was no reason why he should not do his. He would not be a coward. 

And Sansa…what would Sansa think of him if he hid back here? He had come to help her family, to defend her home. It would only be yet another betrayal if he stayed behind. 

Slowly, painfully, he made himself stand. It had been a while since he stood properly, and the floor rocked a little when he did. But it righted itself quickly, and he stood shivering in his borrowed shirt and wondering what he was meant to do next. 

His jacket lay near to where he had been lying, the sword and armor not far away. He slipped the jacket back on, at least hoping to prepare himself slightly for what was to come. And his armor…he would need that too. 

Just as he was slowly strapping the pieces back on, trying not to notice how heavy it all felt now, he heard footsteps behind him. 

“What are you doing?”

Sansa. 

“Getting ready,” he said, avoiding her eye.

“You can’t,” she said firmly, “You’re still hurt, you shouldn’t be out there-"

“I’m not staying here.” Unwillingly he turned to face her, deeply regretting the look of fear in her eyes. 

Cautiously, he took her hand in his. She did not protest.

“I said I would fight for you,” he said, “I promised to protect your family, I can’t do that if hiding down in the crypts.” 

“So you’re going to die for us? You don’t need to do that. You never needed to do that.”

“I won’t. Not if I can help it. But I need to help, somehow. There’s no point in me being here if I don’t.”

She looked at him, a long, odd look he could not quite place. He wondered, for a moment, what it would be like if he could agree with her, agree to stay safe and refuse to fight, to stay behind with her. It would be so easy to give up now. 

Sansa’s arms went around him then, holding him so tightly it was as if she never intended to let go. He held her back without thinking about it, pulling her closer. It didn’t matter that anyone could see them. It didn’t matter at all. 

“You have to come back,” she whispered into his shoulder, “Don’t you dare die out there. You’ve come this far, don’t you leave me now.”

Theon squeezed his eyes shut as tears sprung into them. He couldn’t promise her anything. She knew that. Now more than ever, he wished he could stay here until the battle was over, here in her arms. 

“I’ll come back,” he said.

“You have to,” she said, “You don’t have a choice.”

That made it easier, then. 

Slowly he released himself from her arms, allowing himself to look her in the eye. She didn’t look tearful – not like him – only determined, fierce. 

“I’ll be waiting for you,” she said, “When you get back…I’ll be here. I’ll look after you again if you need it. And we’ll talk; as long as we like, about anything we want…we’ll be together. I promise you. I’m not letting you go again, not after this.”

Theon swallowed his tears. A feeling of hope, of promise, was beginning to spread through his chest, and he couldn’t let that happen. Couldn’t allow himself to think of the time he might spend with her after, if there was an after. Because there might not be one at all. But she still had hope. He could give her a little back, at least.

“I’ll be there,” he said, his voice almost a whisper.

She nodded. “You stay safe.”

“And you. You heard Jon; don’t stay if you can help it. Please, Sansa.”

She looked almost coldly at him. “Winterfell is my home.”

“As it was mine, for a while. But you have to stay safe. Please.”

Sansa did not agree, but she didn’t shake her head either. Instead she squeezed his hand one more time, and then he left; left before he could look at her again, before he could second guess himself. He had to do this. For Winterfell – and for her.

Outside it was bitter cold again, he was shivering before long. The still tender wound on his arm stung in the wind, but he ignored it. At least it meant he was still alive. 

Around him the remaining survivors who would stay and fight hurried to and fro, and soon Theon was caught up with them. He went to the battlements, to where he would be able to see the army arriving from a distance. Though he knew this could be his final hour, knew death was coming for them all, he felt strangely calm. He was here, at least, here at Winterfell. He had said his goodbyes to Sansa; even out here he could still feel her arms around him. There should have been more time, for them. They could have had hours, days to talk like she said they would. But he was lucky to get what he did, at least. If he died with only that, it would be enough. 

And now the long wait began again, to be followed by the last long night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BOOM.  
>  I know this was very short, sorry. My feelings about the last bit kind of tied in with my feelings on how this next episode will go as a whole; I tried to reflect on the feelings of us as viewers watching what could be the last night for these characters. So you could say the sense of impending doom motivated me a little. I'd like to think this fic, especially the last chapter, is kind of a "good luck" to all our faves tomorrow night...though I'm thinking the real thing will be far more devastating than what I've written...


End file.
